Square Enix recently opined that making remakes is much harder than making original games– and it’s easy to see why they feel this way. Especially when it comes to beloved classics, remakes always face some tough questions- should they play it safe and stick to the source material as closely as possible, or should they try and put their own take on things at the risk of alienating the original’s fanbase?
Final Fantasy 7 Remake is looking to strike a delicate balance between those two, but it’s clear that it’s doing a lot of new things. That is instantly apparent in its gameplay, of course, as well as its visuals, but it’s also clear that it’ll do so in terms of narrative as well. Given the fact that the entire first episode of the remake – which will be a full-fledged game in and of itself – is set just in Midgar, that stands to reason.
Recently, while speaking with Siliconera at the Hong Kong Games Festival – where Sony and Square Enix brought Final Fantasy 7 Remake – producer Yoshinori Kitase spoke about that a little bit more. According to Kitase, though the upcoming RPG is a remake, it will still innovate the way the series has historically done. Kitase emphasized that the development team is comprised of both, veterans who worked on the original game, and young blood that grew up on the original game. With that kind of a mixture in its dev team, the game should be able to strike the balance it’s looking to achieve as a remake.
As I mentioned, developing a remake can be a tricky business, but we do have some notable examples of ones that successfully managed to reimagine their originals. One very recent example, in fact, is Resident Evil 2. As things stand right now, it’s looking like Final Fantasy 7 Remake will be able to find a similar level of success- here’s hoping anyway.
We’ll find out not too long from now, with the game launching on March 3, 2020 for the PS4.